¹³ A curse is on him who is building his house by wrongdoing, and his rooms by doing what is not right; who makes use of his neighbour without payment, and gives him nothing for his work;

¹⁰ They are building up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with evil-doing.

¹³ Do not be cruel to your neighbour or take what is his; do not keep back a servant's payment from him all night till the morning.

⁴ See, the money which you falsely kept back from the workers cutting the grass in your field, is crying out against you; and the cries of those who took in your grain have come to the ears of the Lord of armies.

¹⁴ Do not be hard on a servant who is poor and in need, if he is one of your countrymen or a man from another nation living with you in your land.

¹⁵ Give him his payment day by day, not keeping it back over night; for he is poor and his living is dependent on it; and if his cry against you comes to the ears of the Lord, it will be judged as sin in you.

⁹ A curse on him who gets evil profits for his family, so that he may put his resting-place on high and be safe from the hand of the wrongdoer!

¹⁰ You have been a cause of shame to your house by cutting off a number of peoples, and sinning against your soul.

¹¹ For the stone will give a cry out of the wall, and it will be answered by the board out of the woodwork.

⁵ And I will come near to you for judging; I will quickly be a witness against the wonder-workers, against those who have been untrue in married life, against those who take false oaths; against those who keep back from the servant his payment, and who are hard on the widow and the child without a father, who do not give his rights to the man from a strange country, and have no fear of me, says the Lord of armies.

¹⁸ So this is what the Lord has said about Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah: They will make no weeping for him, saying, Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! they will make no weeping for him, saying, Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!

¹⁰ Others go about without clothing, and though they have no food, they get in the grain from the fields.

¹¹ Between the lines of olive-trees they make oil; though they have no drink, they are crushing out the grapes.

⁴ And the king of Egypt made Eliakim his brother king over Judah and Jerusalem, changing his name to Jehoiakim. And Neco took his brother Jehoahaz away to Egypt.

³⁵ And Jehoiakim gave the silver and gold to Pharaoh, taxing the land by his orders to get the money; the people of the land had to give silver and gold, everyone as he was taxed, to make the payment to Pharaoh-necoh.

³⁶ Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he became king; he was ruling in Jerusalem for eleven years; his mother's name was Zebidah, the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah.

³⁷ He did evil in the eyes of the Lord as his fathers had done.